I’m done

I think the TMS approach can make sense for moderate chronic pain, pain that moves around, or pain that comes and goes. But not for severe, constant pain. I’m talking about a 10 out of 10 that’s there 24/7 and makes you want to blow your head off. This whole idea that “trying to get rid of symptoms reinforces the brain that something is wrong, so you have to act like nothing’s wrong while you work on emotions” is bullshit to me. Of course I want the symptom gone. I’m in extreme back pain that literally makes me feel suicidal. How exactly are you supposed to “engage more in life” when you can’t even focus during a conversation with friends?

I’ve gone running. I’ve gone to the gym. But after a short time, I’m back home crying because I can’t sustain it consistently. This whole thing is fucking brutal for me. I’ve tried journaling. I’ve meditated. I do it regularly, and after a while I just burn out because I don’t even have the strength to hold a pen and write. I’m completely fed up with nothing working. I’ve read all the books. I’ve done psychotherapy. I’ve tried everything.

And when people tell me “do nothing” or “stop fighting,” or my favorite “talk to your brain”, I try for a while and then I just can’t. I feel like I’m burning alive, and nothing gives me even a tiny bit of relief. Not even avoidance behaviors. I’m so sick of this miserable existence.

I’m not exaggerating when I say I would’ve preferred cancer over this shit. At least then you die with society’s empathy. Or even being paralyzed from the waist down and stuck in a wheelchair. I could sit in a wheelchair and still watch a movie and actually focus on the TV. With this chronic pain bullshit, I can’t do anything at all. It’s Christmas today, and this is by far the worst Christmas of my entire life.

I’m sorry, you are really nice people, but I think this is not for me. I’m tired.

 

I hear you. I havent gotten better yet either.

However, you sound really desperate. Understand me, i have lost my life, to the point where i feel like i would kill someone to just have back pain for a day. I know you dont feel that way, you must absolutely be in agony.

The question is, are you journaling and meditating to be good for yourself, or to see immediate relief of symptoms?

You see, I have always felt like this was my bodies ultimate way of finally saying: "no". I always told myself to toughen up and to just work through it, but alas, it never worked. Now i cant ignore my body, now im all ears (pun very much intended).

When people say: 'dont fight', do you actually believe in that? Have you ever had someone pinch your muscle? You'll feel pain at first, but once you actually start feeling towards it, the body softens up and the pain resides. This is true, i practice it a lot. Letting go is a skill that you can learn. In all truth, im not good at letting go, but do we have an option?

I dont have a fucking choice. I either get better, or ill stay my entire life miserable and handicapped. Its why i dont see myself ever leaving this forum; i dont have a fucking place to go. I have always found that pain lessens when you let go and you become friends with it.

Are you still meditating, are you still journaling? If you leave this forum, where will you go? Will your pain suddenly get better?

Understand: I feel about as hopeless as you do on a very regular basis. But i will keep coming back, because i got nowhere to go.

Maybe try to start with making yourself feel better about your pain. Its like tinnitus, try to accept it wont go away. 'Radical acceptance'. Just try to make yourself feel less bad about your terrible situation. You know that guy in the iron lung? He lived a good life, no matter how crippled. Try to influence the things you can, and make peace with the things you can not change. You dont have a choice, let go.

 

Do you really think that guy in the iron lung lived a good life? lol. I guess we have very different ideas of what a “good life” even is. What do you want me to say man, a life with intense pain every second of every minute of every day is not a life. I’m not saying I’ll abandon this approach forever, I think it’s the only thing I have left, but everything has a limit. If I don’t figure this shit out in the next few years, I’ll just leave this world and this miserable existence. Fuck this universe.

 

Well, he lived a better life in that bloody thing than others, myself included, would have. Havr you actually tried letting go? I am bad at showing compassion, im a logical guy. What are you currently doing to cope with your 'miserable existence? Do you have an idea why you even got tms in the first place? Did you do the SEP?

 

I am so sorry to read this @Marcos - I haven't replied to you before but during Thanksgiving break I was going through a really rough time with terrible symptoms and I found this forum while you were making some of your first posts here; I was inspired by your determination to get better and thought, well if he can do this work, I can too.

I completely relate to everything you're saying and have had all of the thoughts you expressed here, from the "I wish it was cancer" to the feeling of burning alive to the feeling like you've tried everything.

I don't think you're going to be like an iron lung patient; even if you are in pain, you can do all these things: you can walk, you can run, you can write, etc. The fact that you changed your picture to Liam Neeson in The Grey tells me there's some fight left in you!

I think the problem is, this isn't really something that gets better when you "fight" it. You say you've read all the books—have you read through all of Great Pain Deception? The way Steve O calls out some of the behaviors we get into, trying harder to get better, just throwing *more* at our recovery, seems like it might be useful for you to read. Also, even if you have read all the books, I find that often when I read something once I don't *truly* understand it. In school that's no big deal, you can just cram for a test and forget it later. But here it is vitally important that these concepts sink into your subconscious. For me what has been helpful is reading the ebook versions of Sarno/etc and copy/pasting passages that I find important into my notes app and manually going through and boldfacing/highlighting the parts that stand out to me. This way I end up reading each of these passages two or three times. Whatever works—but I think engaging with this stuff deeply is important.

The other piece I'd suggest that may not be something you've really tried yet, is self-compassion. You say you've tried psychotherapy, but have you tried actually being kind to yourself and treating yourself in your mind like someone you are fond of? There's plenty of grit and determination in the way you write—which is part of what inspired me in the first place—but I wonder if you aren't beating yourself up at the same time that you're cursing the universe? In any case, I've been there, to both of those places, and neither has helped me.

Your pain has shifted before while you were doing the SEP. Even if it seems intolerable now, know that it can and has changed. In my worst moments, my partner often reminds me that I've had better days before and I will again.

The thing about doing this work, as everyone on here keeps telling me, is that you don't really get direct "results" from it: things change slowly in the background, and meanwhile you have the opportunity to discover yourself and become who you actually are. If that scares you, good—it scared me too. I was clinging to a lot of unhelpful behaviors from my life before this, that I wanted to change subconsciously but didn't know how to and thought I was trapped forever. I think in my case that's where a lot of the tension came from and I'm still working to unwind and resolve it. I wonder if any of this is true for you as well.

I'll end here by saying that a month ago I was in the middle of a flare, in awful pain, and the past two weeks I haven't had any flares that even approached that. I'm wearing a belt again, which I thought I'd never do (I realize that sounds silly, but with the insane burning around my waist I used to have this is a big deal for me!). Thanksgiving was one of the worst experiences of my life, but I pushed through and took some ibuprofen and spent the evening with friends. Yesterday—Christmas day—I was pretty much pain free all day, which feels unbelievable to type actually. Things can and do change, sometimes randomly but eventually not randomly, eventually you will have control back over your life, but in a gentler, looser way that feels better to you.

 

Hey bro, yeah, I read The Great Pain Deception. By far the best TMS book out there in my opinion. I also watched all the success stories Steve uploads on YouTube in his “Wall of Victory” segment. I used to watch one every night to stay motivated.

Everything you’re talking about like highlighting key parts of the books, rereading them, writing things down in a notebook, I already did all that. I’ve reread those notes a million times. I have all the information burned into my brain. I watched all the documentaries, all the Alan Gordon videos, all the Dan Buglio stuff, everything.

I got to a point after a few months where I was honestly sick of so much information. I’d put on a Dan video and already knew exactly what he was going to say, so I’d just turn it off. I decided to stop consuming TMS-related content altogether, except maybe an occasional success story once in a while. That’s it.

Time has passed, and I still haven’t been able to lower the high intensity of the pain. That’s where my desperation comes from.

Self-compassion is really hard when you’re in severe pain all the time, but I’ve done it. I’ve told myself “it’s okay, we’ll figure this out.” I’ve recorded motivational voice notes while running, just so I could listen to them later when I can’t even get out of bed. Shit bro, I really tried. I even have an evidence list of all the reasons why I believe this is TMS, even though the whole nightmare started at the gym.

What can I say, I’ve tried. You mentioned you had a pain-free day recently, and that honestly sounds utopian to me. Thanks for reading and sharing your perspective. Sending you a hug.

 

I imagine this might not be the most appealing suggestion for you right now—especially as I know you like Steve O’s energetic approach, and in his book he’s quite gung‑ho about getting active. Still, I’d like to plant a small seed for later reflection.

In my experience, real recovery often starts with baby steps. Don’t run before you can walk, as the saying goes. Your TMS‑ing brain—and the nervous system that goes with it—is like a frightened animal that needs to be gently, patiently coaxed into trust again.

Some people can read Sarno, recognize they’re physically sound, and dive straight back into full activity. For them, that confidence alone turns things around. But for others—myself included—our brains remain wary and unconvinced even after we fully grasp the mind/body idea. The body still reacts as if threatened. Exercise or daily stressors can then trigger protective symptoms: pain, fatigue, tightness, and shutdown.

When I tried to resume everything in one big jump, I ended up bed‑bound for months. It was only through gradual, consistent small/'baby' steps that I recovered—from years house‑bound and in constant profound discomfort and pain to living a pretty normal life by comparison.

My suggestion: skip the gym for now. Keep a few light weights at home and do just a handful of reps here and there throughout your day. Build slowly. If movement feels impossible, begin with visualization. When I was bedridden, imagining myself moving helped calm my brain’s resistance and made later steps easier.

Sarno once wrote (in The Mindbody Prescription):

“the occurrence of symptoms reflects too much rage and not enough counteracting soothing elements in one’s life.”

That’s worth remembering. Balance effort with genuine soothing. One supportive way to do that is through Tanner Murtagh’s free 30‑day program on building safety cues—short daily practices that calm the nervous system and retrain your brain to feel safe again. I and many others have found his work wonderfully grounding, soothing and encouraging.



So that’s my two penn’orth—offered for you to take or leave. Maybe, just for today, try noticing one safe moment—a small activity or feeling where your body felt quiet. Log it, however tiny. These moments accumulate; they’re the quiet building blocks of recovery.

Wishing you all the best on the journey back to trust and ease.

 

Ah then you are well ahead of me! I still think you will get better. At the end of the day it has been helping me to remember Sarno’s opinion that pretty much everyone does get better with this treatment. And in his practice patients would just attend a few group lectures—but that was probably a powerful experience of being in a kind of community with others going through the exact same thing. And crucially it was just a few small concentrated doses of information from a trusted source you could interact with rather than the now somewhat overwhelming array of TMS stories and books you can find online. I wonder if that made a difference.

Anyway I wish you the best. What else can you do indeed!

 

I think when things are really bad it's fine to take pain medication for awhile. Sarno agreed with this. When I first learned about TMS I was in chronic pain and took tramadol for many years. It gave me enough relief that I could focus on working on my TMS. The down side is that once my pain was gone I had to start tapering off the medication and it was difficult at times, but I got through it. Then I was pain free and medication free. Some people may disagree with this approach, but my feeling is that we don't have to be purists about how we approach recovery.

 

Meds don’t do anything for me, I even tried tapentadol one week ago and it didn’t help, that’s why I’m so desperate. It’s insane,

 

I understand. The meds didn't lessen the pain, but they helped me cope with having pain--more psychologically helpful than physical.

 

@Marcos

Its ok to be tired. I just wanted to say, a big shift for me was my “f*** it” moment. I basically said, I give up trying to change you pain, I give up trying to control everything in my life and I hit rock bottom. I let my body be in control.

I had a severe injury, and I had constant 10/10 pain, and I was convinced I was the 1%, the must have something structurally wrong.

So I consigned myself to being indifferent, to not caring.

Above you’ve talked about so much fear, and lots of anxiety about the future. I was there, I wanted so desperately for some external fix. I said I believed it was TMS, but I was still forcing myself in the Gym doing PT even though I was trying to say I wasn’t. There was the part of me convinced it was structural, some part of me still won’t let that go.

But I have 28 years of emotional pain, of learned behaviours and most of all anxiety. I was never going to fix that in a year, but the big shift for me is to be excited about the future.

I know that feels far away, with 10/10 pain, but say “f***” it and somatic track how that feels, let your mind let it go, and let your body tell you how you feel.

I had a hard day today (lost a family member unexpectedly, been the worse Xmas ever), emotionally, and my body is telling me it doesn’t feel safe, but that doesn’t need to be scary anymore, it’s just TMS warning me I’m extremely sad. But I’m feeling the pain, as if it’s emotional pain.

We are here with you, whenever you need. And we feel your pain.

 

@cafe_bustelo just wanted to say that I think I speak for all TMSers to say that nothing sounds silly in this world… you - a belt, me - certain types of bra strap once your brain makes little things dangerous, it’s using fear as a distraction!

 

This 100x

Never be ashamed of anything here. Were all so alike. Its funny cause every story starts with *something something perfectionism and denying oneself* and i relate to it so much but thats cause were all the same. And were all here to heal together

 

I'm sorry about that, I hope youre ok

That is a terrible christmas indeed.

 

@Mani, I see you. I hear you. I am so sorry you are going through this. I understand the desire to give up and honestly, if that’s how you’re feeling, give up on the techniques. For now. Stop doing mind body practices and simply allow yourself to just be. You aren’t the first person to have consistent, constant, 10/10 pain but still had TMS. And beat it. You can absolutely do this. But I would advise to take a pause on the techniques for now. Even overdoing them can have the opposite effect.

however, I can see and feel the anger and desperation in this post. I may get flack for this but this is what I do sometimes when anger overwhelms me: You could punch a pillow or your bed mattress and just scream. Cuss out the universe. In a safe space, of course. Just allow that frustration a way out. Sometimes writing about it isn’t enough. Again, in a safe, non destructive way.

 

I remember reaching a point where I was just done and angry too. I know this feeling very well, and I’m sorry you’re feeling it. What surprised me was that stepping back, and not fixing helped my body mind and body settle more than trying harder ever did. For me, healing started with feeling safer, gentleness and kindness toward myself, and not doing more.

You certainly know this is TMS because it’s moved for you to another location before, now let all the information sink in. It takes the brain a hot minute to catch up.

 

I understand you perfectly. I was in the same spot a few years back... before my double hips replacement. I have been sick for 15 years, on the psychosomatic path for 7 years. Nothing conclusive and permanent. I have had countless of emotional releases/traumas healing/psychological discoveries... still in need of powerful immunosuppressant drugs just to be able to... limp! I have a cold right now and needed to stop my meds... back in a wheelchair it is! I'm so fed up with all the esoteric mumbo jumbo bullcrap (EDIT: I do NOT question the TMS theory! I'm talking about the people commenting out of their *ss giving TMS diagnosis like candies and medical advices without knowing anything, always 100% sure of themselves. ) that I read on this forum.
Wish you luck.

PS: and yes I know I sound angry, it's because I am and with good reasons!

 

I know that if you just joined, you’re probably in terrible pain, but I just wanted to say that healing comes from within, it’s up to us to learn about our causes of pain. When I first started out I was desperate for quick fixes and desperate for instant replies from specialists etc. Alan’s book, Steve Os book all brilliant, Sarno brilliant. You’ll find one you’ll relate and stick to, I’m not there yet it’s a long process!

I know @JanAtheCPA will give you some excellent advice about the SEP, and the right books etc but I know I get quite dispondent about negative posts like the above. TMS is a well-proven theory, not “Mumbo-Jumbo” and it’s up to my own emotional state to brush that off and continue on my own healing path. When I have doubts in TMS, like reading the above, I go back to the Success Stories. There are people on here who are genuinely trying to help, and are helping far more than pharmasutical companies and doctors.

 

Really wonder why people get on a TMS forum to shit on TMS. I get that this forum turns into an echo chamber quickly and there will be a significant amount of survivorship bias.

Although, I find myself relating to the incredible attitude of the TMS sufferers here way more than the "woe is me" crowd on other chronic pain forums.

Yes, most of us arent doing that great, but we ARE trying to make the most of it. Calling this mumbo jumbo is laughable. Maybe youre at home at a chronic pain forum where everyone listens to each others sorrows all day.

I personally choose the other option: a smidge of hope i may get better. I'd hate to stay my entire life like this knowing that i didnt exhaust every single available option.

The people here arent village crazies, they are legit resilient loving folks with an incredible presence. I know every single one of them is a brave and courageous fighter. If i were to try to get better from anything which requires mental fortitude, id want these people to support me. And they havent just said the things i wanted em to.

If this doesnt float your boat, feel free to go somewhere else, but i choose this space and these people because i need this